Sore Gums, Stardust, and Succulents

This morning I distracted myself at the dentist's office with the July 2013 edition of National Geographic and I was very excited to read about a spacecraft launched in 2004 called Stardust. 

It went way out in the solar system and collected stardust that was returned to The Utah Desert (!) in a parachuted capsule for the study team to recover and study. Based in part on the information gathered from Stardust, some new theories about the birth of our solar system have developed. 

I love our Solar System! If you are remotely interested, click here for the link to the article. 

If you are not even remotely interested, the picture above is for you. It has nothing to do with space exploration, but it is a lovely little succulent garden at the deli in San Simeon that Mr. Last and I visited earlier this summer. I'd like to create something similar along the walkway at the entrance to our home. 

Oh. And the extraction sites where the infected broken molar and its compadres were removed from my mouth last week are healing nicely, thankyouverymuch. The worst is over, and restoration of Oma's oral health and wellbeing has begun. Take good care of your teeth, kids, because deferred maintenance is very costly.